mrissa | Reading

Not to be all Youtube recs all the time, but the same mutual who shared the Greensleeves video shared this tribute to the city of Kyoto via a compilation of anime clips set in Kyoto, to the tune of "Toki Doki" by Takénobu, which has the chorus "boku no Kyoto" (my Kyoto), and I loved it very much.

Since several of my Dreamwidth friends have been to Kyoto and are fond of the city, I had to share. You can also go to the AO3 location and leave the creator some kudos if you're inclined :-)

Watch on YouTube

Current Music: Takénobu: Toki Doki

larryhammer

A link for you, and a link for you, and, yes, a link for you, too. All three are for the anonymous gifter of a paid account -- thank you, whoever you are:

Drone videos of black sand beaches in Iceland.

There I Ruined It presents Santa Claus Is Coming to Town as sung by Radiohead, to the tune of “Creep.” (via)

A contemporary (1813) review of Pride and Prejudice. That Mr Collins was considered a recognizable type and not a caricature is interesting. (via lost)

---L.

Subject quote from On Grafton Street, Nanci Griffith.

antisoppist

Rose made Phebe promise that she would bring her stocking into the 'Bower' as she called her pretty room, on Christmas morning, because that first delicious rummage loses half its charm if two little night-caps at least do not meet over the treasures, and two happy voices Oh and Ah together.

So when Rose opened her eyes that day they fell upon faithful Phebe, rolled up in a shawl, sitting on the rug before a blazing fire, with her untouched stocking laid beside her.

"Merry Christmas!" cried the little mistress, smiling gayly.

"Merry Christmas!" answered the little maid, so heartily that it did one good to hear her.

conuly posting in

agonyaunt

Dear Prudence,

My sister and I are identical twins, but we grew up terrorizing each other. I was the girly girl, while she was on her way to a PhD in preschool. I had a learning disorder, and my sister would constantly correct people and say she wasn’t the ”stupid” one—I was.

My sister started the college track in ninth grade while I went to a middling school. Our parents did their best to treat us equally and celebrate our accomplishments, but you really can’t compare taking a beauty school test to getting a master’s at 21. I will admit I gave as good as I could get. If my sister were the smart one, I was the pretty one, which was stupid, as we were identical twins. I want to say we settled down and grew up to be close, but that would be a lie.

When I got married and was obsessed with all the details, our cousin jokingly called me a bridezilla, and my sister cut her off. She told her this was my big day, and it wasn’t like I accomplished anything else worth noting. This wasn’t the first or last time my sister said stuff like this. I have been married for 15 years and have two beautiful children. We used IVF and have a few embryos still left frozen.

My husband and I were debating whether to have a third child when my sister bulldozed in. She was ready to be a mom, had everything planned out, saved, and sorted, except her eggs weren’t viable. So the completely obvious solution was to give her our embryos!

We refused, and my sister threw a fit. I was apparently stealing her only chance to be a mother, and worse, my parents are on her side. They think that giving her the embryos costs us “nothing,” and we already have children, so I was denying my sister out of pure spite. I don’t know how I would feel if my sister bothered to ask rather than make a demand, but it was a demand and one that isn’t happening. My problem is that I am very afraid it might permanently poison my relationship with my parents. We were supposed to travel to their place for Christmas, but after all this, I am afraid to. Help!

—Twin Trouble

( Read more... )

conuly posting in

agonyaunt

Dear Care and Feeding,

When she was 8, we adopted “Alina.” She was the daughter of a close friend, and lost both her parents in an extra painful way. Understandably, she was in a lot of pain the first few years and needed extra parental support. But she worked hard in therapy, and we supported her, and at 15, she’s doing well. The problem is more with our other kids, her siblings. They love each other, but they are all convinced she needs extra care and protection all the time, when actually she’s ready to grow. She’s been pushing back at it, but I think it’s time for us to step in as parents. She says she needs room to mess up and have her own social life, and I think that’s fair.

A classmate asks Alina to the fall dance, and she accepts? Her 14-year-old brother steps in and tells him it will be a double date with him and his girlfriend. Alina dies of embarrassment. Our teens are going to swim at the public pool? Without Alina, they just go together. With Alina, her 16-year-old sister announces they must have an adult. This type of stuff seems to have ramped up since she started high school, and I don’t know how to dial it down. I’m glad her siblings love and support her, but they shouldn’t be taking on this extra role, and she’s also asked them to stop so she can learn on her own. We absolutely do not want to set up a weird dynamic between our kids, but it feels like it’s already started. I love that they look out for each other, but it needs to be appropriate. My husband and I had multiple conversations with the kids about this, but it only stops them from doing concrete examples we mention, not the overall behavior.

—Give Her Space

( Read more... )

mizkit

I was trying to get up to 50K written in 2 weeks (for reasons, and I succeeded), but I didn't have enough brain to write my book, so I asked for fic prompts and someone suggested a Kpop Demon Hunters prompt of "How Sussie ended up with Derpy's hat" and I thought, I can do that!

In an ideal world, you would go read this over at my Patreon and become a member there if you're not already, but nobody's going to strike you down for reading it here. :)

( Read more... )

thistleingrey

If I've gotten something wrong or blurry regarding these weaving-related terms, please say. This post does not explain how to weave; below are only some ingredients distilled from others' discussions and investigations.
( some basics, some tools )

( sociolinguistic footnote on "weft" )

swan_tower

A screencap of a sonnet titled "The Novelist Laments in Verse" by Marie Brennan:Shall I compare me to a wrung-out rag?I am more limp, more grimy, and more drained.The labor of a novel makes me sag;my fervor for this enterprise has waned.Sometimes -- ofttimes -- I’ve craved a restful week,in which no scenes or chapters I compose,no useful details in my reading seek:but sans those things, a novel never grows.So my eternal labor must go on,in word by word and day by tiresome day,until the moment when, quite pale and wan,I can, arm raised in feeblest triumph, say:I may be brain-dead and completely beat,but after all these months, my book’s complete.

(I have finished a draft of The Worst Monk in Omnu, just in time to kick back for the holidays!)

jazzfish

The Cinematheque is running a full David Lynch retrospective in December: all ten of his feature films, plus a collection of shorts and the entirety of the new Twin Peaks season. I'm not certain whether I like Lynch's work but it surely is memorable.

Of those: I quite want to see Blue Velvet (seen once, basically no memory of it), Lost Highway (seen at least twice, fuzzy memories), Mulholland Drive (never seen; sounds like a more coherent Lost Highway), and The Elephant Man (never seen; supposedly Very Very Good). I have some interest in Wild At Heart (Lynch directing Nicolas Cage?) and Inland Empire (more Lynchian surrealism; might be more than I want all at once). I have pretty much no interest in Dune (ugh), Fire Walk With Me (ugh, though for different reasons; also, seen it), Eraserhead (from what I've heard I do not need that look into David Lynch's id), and The Straight Story (meh). I do not have it in me to watch eighteen hours of Twin Peaks in four days, though if I did I'd probably also watch Fire Walk With Me. Also no interest in the short films (see above re Eraserhead), and besides those are already over and done.

I'm so glad the Cinematheque exists. It's not as historic as the Lyric in Blacksburg or as fancy as the AFI Silver in DC, but it's comfortable, and it shows a decent amount of stuff I'm interested in. Vancouver honestly has a pretty impressive non-mainstream film scene: the Cinematheque, the more upscale VIFF Theatre, and the more... pop-culture-y, I guess, Rio. Plus the Cineplex in International Village mall that shows random foreign films.

Potential post-xmas schedule below, so I have it written down and can stop saying "wait what am i doing again?"

( A lot of movies )

wychwood

The carol service on Sunday felt terribly chaotic, but there's a reasonable chance no one in the congregation noticed, which is sort of a win. One of the instruments playing was horrifically out-of-tune, to the point where I was struggling to stay in the same key as the organ because it was so distracting; everyone except the organist inexplicably stopped at the end of verse one of a choir-only item and then had to hurriedly scramble back in as she kept going, but she said we were sufficiently in unison that it almost sounded intentional; and there was one choir item with a three-part split where the first soprano completely failed to provide the descant that was supposed to be there, but since the rest of us ploughed on with the melody and the lower harmony probably no one else could tell. I was very glad that that one wasn't my fault... at least directly.

(Indirectly, I had been singing the top line previously, and was moved onto the melody at a rehearsal where the first sop was absent, so I suspect that what happened was that she was expecting me to come in and panicked when I did something else entirely. But. The congregation didn't know it was supposed to be there, so.)

I got roped into helping out with the last graduation ceremony, at which I can't really complain because it was only my second of the season. The VC said nice things to me (twice!) about my scroll-handing job, which suggests to me very strongly that he must have overheard me talking to some of the other people before the ceremony about the time he had to move me because I was accidentally blocking the line of sight for the official graduation photographer taking pictures of the handshakes, my personal most-mortifying graduation moment of the last ten years. But embarrassing though that realisation also is, that's actually really nice of him to care enough about the fact that I felt bad to deliberately say something positive! The old VC would never.

(There was also a bit in his most recent all-staff email which, when boiled down out of the delicate phrasing, amounted to "literally all my colleagues thought it was hysterical watching me, a non-hugger, get hugged by lots of excited graduands". I do so enjoy having a VC who does a good impression of being human instead of an Auton! Even when I disagree with him he mostly sounds like an actual human being!)

This week is mostly choir, but I am at least working from home which is going to be amazing.

oursin

[F]irst wild beaver spotted in Norfolk in 500 years and Wild beavers may have spread further than we realise:

It is not clear whether the Pensthorpe beaver, whose sex and age is unknown, was illegally released into the reserve by activists using a practice known as beaver bombing. It is possible it wandered of its own accord into the Wensum – an aquifer-fed chalk river whose name is derived from the Old English adjective for “wandering”.
“It could be a naturally dispersing wild beaver,” said Emily Bowen, a spokesperson for the Beaver Trust, a charity that aims to restore beavers to regenerate landscapes. She said that there were established wild populations in eight areas in England at the moment.
Wild beavers have also been spotted in Kent, Hampshire, Somerset, Wiltshire and Hereford, she said. Norfolk has some captive beavers but none have been reported missing.

Maybe it's a sinister beaver underground conspiracy....

And if we are talking aquatic mammals, see also otters: otters’ revival in Britain. Still rare only 20 years ago, the charismatic animals are in almost every UK river and a conservation success story.

White storks to be introduced to, believe it or not, Dagenham.

A rather different story: voyaging owls: Two burrowing owls stowed away on a cruise ship out of Miami, and are now living the high life at a Spanish resort before returning to the US next month. We think they may have been in flight from being a threatened species in Florida....

elisem

Yes, I am cutting it close. I blame getting COVID Halloween week, and having to rest like a potato. Which I am still doing, but I have advanced to the stage of literate potato. I hope. Because this thing is due in, what, fifty-some hours?

Anyhow, I came here to post that I have reached the milestone in writing the current draft where I just reread a section and said out loud, "OK, so there are actually a few bits in here that aren't completely shitful." Like, it's a known milestone. So that's encouraging.

Onward.

(Yes, that's why nothing new is in the shop this week. I have been on a schedule of sleep, write, sleep, write, with meds and basic necessities in there as needed. Not enough oomph left to photograph new work and still write and edit. Potato has limited spoonage here. But Potato is too proud to default on Yuletide. Please point people to go shop in the Etsy shop, though. Potato is fretting about this being a rough December for so many artists. Oh! Remind me to tell you about Boxing Day, which is going to be completely bonkers in a new way.)

larryhammer

For Poetry Monday, more autumn from an early Modernist:

Leaves, Frederic Manning

A frail and tenuous mist lingers on baffled and intricate branches;
Little gilt leaves are still, for quietness holds every bough;
Pools in the muddy road slumber, reflecting indifferent stars;
Steeped in the loveliness of moonlight is earth, and the valleys,
Brimmed up with quiet shadow, with a mist of sleep.

But afar on the horizon rise great pulses of light,
The hammering of guns, wrestling, locked in conflict
Like brute, stone gods of old struggling confusedly;
Then overhead purrs a shell, and our heavies
Answer, with sudden clapping bruits of sound,
Loosening our shells that stream whining and whimpering precipitately,
Hounding through air athirst for blood.

And the little gilt leaves
Flicker in falling, like waifs and flakes of flame.

Manning (1882-1935) was an Australian-born writer best known for his WWI novels, but he was also a significant Imagist. This is from 1915.

---L.

Subject quote from In August, William Dean Howells.

antisoppist

Davy met them at Bright River with a big two-seated sleigh full of furry robes … and a bear hug for Anne. The two girls snuggled down in the back seat. The drive from the station to Green Gables had always been a very pleasant part of Anne’s weekends home. She always recalled her first drive home from Bright River with Matthew. That had been in spring and this was December, but everything along the road kept saying to her, “Do you remember?” The snow crisped under the runners; the music of the bells tinkled through the ranks of tall pointed firs, snow-laden. The White Way of Delight had little festoons of stars tangled in the trees. And on the last hill but one they saw the great gulf, white and mystical under the moon but not yet ice-bound.

[...]

They opened the parlor and distributed the gifts before breakfast because the twins, even Dora, couldn’t have eaten anything if they hadn’t. Katherine, who had not expected anything except, perhaps, a duty gift from Anne, found herself getting presents from every one. A gay, crocheted afghan from Mrs. Lynde … a sachet of orris root from Dora … a paper-knife from Davy … a basketful of tiny jars of jam and jelly from Marilla … even a little bronze chessy cat for a paper-weight from Gilbert.

And, tied under the tree, curled up on a bit of warm and woolly blanket, a dear little brown-eyed puppy, with alert, silken ears and an ingratiating tail. A card tied to his neck bore the legend, “From Anne, who dares, after all, to wish you a Merry Christmas.”

oursin

Happy birthday,

dancing_moon and

sdn!

sovay

For the first night of Hanukkah, my mother accompanied me to None Shall Escape (1944) at the Harvard Film Archive. It snowed into the late afternoon, silver-dusting the unsanded streets. The wind chill feels like zero Fahrenheit.

spatch and I lit the first night's candle for strength.

Current Music: Bruce Adler, "Hu-Tsa-Tsa"

asakiyume

A mutual on Mastodon shared this mind-blowing Youtube video about creating a dress based on the earliest surviving version (1564) of the ballad "Greensleeves." It was fascinating for all the details about Elizabethan dressmaking (and also food--there's a verse about food, too; 18 verses in all). The way the expert creators researched their piece of the overall outfit (silk smock, crimson stockings, pumps as white as milk, gown of grassy green), the decisions they made (e.g., in the whole inventory of Elizabethan garments, there is no extant silk smock or record of one, so they interpreted the lyric as meaning a linen smock embroidered with silk), and then the techniques used to create the items were just fascinating.

So here's that video--long! But worth it, I thought. There are guinea pigs with ruffs! It was filmed at a stately home in Dorset!

Watch on YouTube

They also made a music video--also long! (almost 10 minutes), in which you can seen Lady Greensleeves gradually acquiring her costume while still rebuffing the suitor. Here's a link.

Current Music: Greensleeves!

oursin

Last week's bread held out fairly well until it did a variety of mould-related activity. There were still some rolls left, fortunately.

Friday night supper: Gujerati khichchari (with cashew nuts) which I do not seem to have made for absolute yonks.

Saturday breakfast rolls: brown grated apple: Light Spelt flour, molasses, a touch of ginger (this didn't really come through, probably overpowered by the molasses): rose like absolute whoah.

Today's lunch: the smoked haddock and pulses thing - smoked haddock loin fillets baked in cream + water with bay leaf, mace and 5-pepper blend, flaked and then layered with bottled black beans (would buy again), some of the cooking liquid added, top sprinkled with panko crumbs and baked in moderate oven for c. 40 minutes, served with baked San Marzano tomatoes, and slow-cooked tenderstem broccoli, finished with lime, some of which seemed less tenderstemmed than one might have expected.

sartorias

A peaceful Hanukkah to all who celebrate. And to all others (who are sane) let's wish that those who do celebrate can do so in peace.

profiterole_reads

Netflix's Wake Up Dead Man, the third Knives Out movie, wasn't for me.

The first one had an interesting mystery. I guessed a lot about the second one, but it was pretty fun and original. I also guessed a lot about this one and found it quite depressing. Plus, we didn't even see Benoit Blanc's husband again.

Nice cast, though, especially Kerry Washington and Andrew Scott. <3

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mrissa

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December 2025

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Page Summary

asakiyume - My Kyoto
larryhammer - “i just found this smile to think about you / you’re a saturday night far from the madding crowd”
antisoppist - Advent calendar 16
conuly in agonyaunt - (no subject)
conuly in agonyaunt - (no subject)
mizkit - Fic: How Sussie Got His Hat
thistleingrey - an inkling of terms
swan_tower - "The Novelist Laments in Verse"
jazzfish - lynch etc
wychwood - christmas approaches like a storm cloud
oursin - Okay, nobody has entered the beaver lodges to check for sewing machines - yet
elisem - Yuletide progress
larryhammer - “Only the querulous cricket grieves, / And shrilling locust weaves / A song of summer dead.”
antisoppist - Advent calendar 15
oursin - (no subject)
sovay - אמתע מעשׂה, אמתע מעשׂה
asakiyume - The Greensleeves Project
oursin - Culinary
sartorias - Wishing . . .
profiterole_reads - Wake Up Dead Man

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Page generated Dec. 16th, 2025 04:59 pm

Barnstorming on an Invisible Segway

The stories are made up, but the problems are real.

Reading

My Kyoto

“i just found this smile to think about you / you’re a saturday night far from the madding crowd”

Advent calendar 16

(no subject)

(no subject)

Fic: How Sussie Got His Hat

an inkling of terms

"The Novelist Laments in Verse"

lynch etc

christmas approaches like a storm cloud

Okay, nobody has entered the beaver lodges to check for sewing machines - yet

Yuletide progress

“Only the querulous cricket grieves, / And shrilling locust weaves / A song of summer dead.”

Advent calendar 15

(no subject)

אמתע מעשׂה, אמתע מעשׂה

The Greensleeves Project

Culinary

Wishing . . .

Wake Up Dead Man

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December 2025

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